PICTURES OF THE SACRED HEART.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume VII, Issue 348, 19 December 1879, Page 11

PICTURES OF THE SACRED HEART.

A decent decision of the Sacred Congregation of Indulgences concerning pictures of the Sacred Heart is as follows : " It is stated in the acts of the Beatification of the Blessed Margaret Mary, as well as in her writings, that the image of the Sacred Heart of Jesus should be sensibly represented to the faithful, and in the picture, appear exteriorly upon the breast of the Divine Saviour. Blessed Margaret Mary declares that the Divine Heart was shone to her resplendent with the rays of light which came forth from it on all sides. She saw the wound which opened the heart, the crown of thorns which environed it, and the cross which surmounted it. She says that our Lord expressed to her the desire to see the image of His natural heart presented to the sight of tbe faithful, that it might soften the hardness of their hearts, declaring that it would be extremely agreeable to Him to be honoured under this image, and that He would repay such homage with the most abundant graces. However, there have been artists who hate protested against this manner of representation, pretending that it is not conformable to the rules of art ; they insinuate that our Loid should be paesented in the act of indicating the wound in His side by His band being placed upon the breast. But, however it may be with the rules oi art, those images of our Saviour in which His most holy Heart is not seen exteriorly, although they may be pious, are not and cannot be called pictures of tbe Sacred Heart of Jesus. Such is not the image enriched with those indulgences which the Roman Pontiffs have accorded to those who pray before a picture of the Sacred Heart of Jesus."

Mrs. Endall, of New York, who is visiting friends at Michigan City piobably will not fool again with a revolver. In handling a pistol which she had asked to see, she managed, without knowing it, to pull back the hammer, when, jokingly placing it to her head, she made some parting requests of her friends, as though about to take her own life, when all were honificd by tbe discharge of the weapon. She narrowly escaped a sudden and unexpected '• taking-off," and was nearly scared tp death us it was, the ball tearing a wicked bole, in the floor behind her.